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R VOLUME 15, ISSUE 4 SEPTEMBER 19, 2013 recess Modern art thrives through SiteWork Art extends beyond museums and galleries, pg. 5 e Naked and Famous In Rolling Waves album review, pg. 3 Paradise Garden Project Artists explore nature across media, pg. 6 SPECIAL TO THE CHRONICLE

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The Duke Chronicle's weekly Art and Entertainment Section

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rVOLUME 15, ISSUE 4 SEPTEMBER 19, 2013

rrecess

Modern art thrives through SiteWork

Art extends beyond museums and galleries, pg. 5

� e Naked and FamousIn Rolling Waves album review, pg. 3

Paradise Garden ProjectArtists explore nature across media, pg. 6

Special to the chronicle

2 | ThursDAY, sepTember 19, 2013 recess The Chronicle

ABOVE: Iranian (Isfahan), Lunette (detail), 1938-39. Stonepaste: monochrome-glazed, assembled as a mosaic; 11¼ x 22 ¾ x 3½ inches (28.6 x 57.8 x 8.9 cm). © 2011 Doris Duke Foundation for Islamic Art, Honolulu, Hawai‘i. Photo by David Franzen.

Doris Duke’s Shangri La Architecture, LAnDScApe, AnD iSLAmic Art

An intimate look at Doris Duke and her Honolulu estate, Shangri La. The exhibition features selections from the Islamic art collection amassed by this stylish American heiress and philanthropist.

NASHER MUSEUM OF ART AT DUKE UNIVERSITY

On view through December 29, 2013

2001 Campus Drive | Durham, NC 27705 | 919-684-5135 | nasher.duke.edu/shangrilaGET TICKETS:DUKEPERFORMANCES.ORG | 919-684-4444

$10 TIXSTUDENTS

DUKE

EVERY SHOW. ALL SEASON. TAKE ADVANTAGE.

DUKE PERFORMANCESIN DURHAM, AT DUKE, THE WORLD, JUST OUTSIDE YOUR DOOR.DUKE PERFORMANCES

INIMITABLE VOCALIST

THEO BLECKMANNHELLO EARTH! THE MUSIC OF KATE BUSH

FRIDAY & SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 27 & 289 PM • PSI THEATRE AT THE

DURHAM ARTS COUNCIL(120 MORRIS ST.)

RESIDENT STRING QUARTET

CIOMPI QUARTETFEATURING THE KRUGER BROTHERS

SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 218 PM • BALDWIN AUDITORIUM

DELUXE CHAMBER TRIO

FINCKEL, SETZER, HAN TRIOBEETHOVEN, SHOSTAKOVICH, DVORÁK

SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 288 PM • BALDWIN AUDITORIUM

CAPTIVATING DIVA+ EXTRAORDINARY JAZZ BAND

BILLY CHILDS JAZZ CHAMBER ENSEMBLE FEAT. DIANNE REEVES

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 48 PM • BALDWIN AUDITORIUM

THIS SATURDAY!!!THIS SATURDAY!!!

rrecess editors

What work?

ess recessrecess

ss recess reditor’s

note

recess

Lauren Feilich.............................................................................................bitter work

Jamie Kessler ....................................................................................caffeinated work

MC Bousquette ............................................................................................party time

Megan Rise.............................................................................................wrecking ball

Kathy Zhou......................................................................a queen’s work is never done

Eliza Bray ...............................................................................................party time too

Minshu Deng.............................................................................................this work is

While reading on my fl ight from rome to Beirut this past summer, i stumbled across an F. Scott Fitzgerald quote that i took out of context and have since held dear:

only a sense, colored with delirious wild excitement, that the ultimately im-portant was happening—

i’ve been restless. it’s the beginning of my last year at Duke. i don’t have any concrete plans and haven’t been inspired enough to make any. instead, i’ve defl ect-ed questions of the future by sardonically mumbling about post-graduation plans to move to Paris or Berlin. i’m surprised—and admittedly, a little fl attered—that no one has yet to further question me.

After discovery of the Fitzgerald quote, i scrawled it into my notebook, circled it fi ve times and stepped off the plane at 3 a.m. in lebanon, feeling enlightened for my next adventure. Then i spent the rest of my summer affi rmed that whatever i did at a given time, from attending music fes-tivals to living abroad to graduating early, was “the ultimately important.” i decided to embody the quote as a new lifestyle. i would create, craft and engineer until every detail in my life felt relevant to the future ahead. Without realizing, i was mak-ing mental notes to myself: what does this refl ect toward my long-term goals; what have i learned; what did i like, or not like. it was uncharacteristically methodical and

calculating, and it was silly.So now, a month into this school year,

i’m sitting in my Central Campus apartment completely stumped over how i’m sup-posed to turn the things that i enjoy most (pen doodles, walks to Durham art spaces, fl owers in mason jars, casual but meaning-ful conversation) into something relevant (like a job, or my fi rst editor’s note). i won-dered when my defi nition of “important” evolved from becoming a painter to going to college to changing my major to advo-cating for the arts. none of these translate easily, and that’s why i just tell everyone that i’m moving to europe.

See, things are transient right now, and that’s unsettling. The spaces we inhabit are impermanent. We move our posses-sions into storage every year, and most of us don’t actually own the furniture we use. We learn something for a semester and then sell back our textbooks. We, along with our relationships, belongings and values, are constantly changing. Because things are so impermanent, we’ve adopt-ed the habit of perceiving everything in terms of how and to what extent they’ll benefi t us. Currently, i think i’m sup-posed to focus on becoming a real person who does important things. Yet here i am, still uncovering old sketchbooks, music al-bums and pairs of shoes. i end up throw-ing them out and grimacing or poking fun at what feels like a past self.

This brings me to my next point. To quote Jim Jarmusch quoting Jean-luc Godard: it’s not where you take things from—it’s where you take them to.

Despite how ridiculous i looked in my fa-vorite outfi t in ninth grade—oversized fl an-nel, blue jeans and a beanie—i still felt like i had confi dence and ownership over my appearance. even though i was too shy as a kid to fully communicate my love for music through my piano or violin performances,

i still wrote my college application essay on Beethoven’s fi fth symphony. And even though i resigned my dream of becoming a writer sometime in middle school, that dream has never felt more tangible than it does now. The person you meet today is embedded with two decades’ worth of sin-cerities and uncertainties. And no matter how embarrassing, how unforgiving or even how inauthentic, these tidbits—these mul-titudes—were once important, so in a way, they still are.

everything matters! right now for me, that involves a one-punch refrigerator poem by my apartment-mate (“why are we per-forming like / imagined silhouettes / that have no passion”). it involves the resolution to make decisions based on where i want to live over following a particular career path. it involves lavender fl owers, strings of lights, women artists and struggling to make a point in French class. it involves the process of rediscovering old writings and doodles and feeling just as proud of them as i did way back when. it involves radicalness, the readiness to embrace change and the will-ingness to view everything as the ultimately important.

Whatever makes you think twice, what-ever moves you, whatever comes up as an afterthought, is relevant. i’m not saying you need to be constantly self-aware. i don’t need you to explain why. i’m asking you to allow yourself to cherish the tiny details and mishaps; to own up to the de-cisions you have made and will make; and to remain unapologetic for what you were, are and will be. The ultimately important becomes you, and i hope it excites you. We choose what to make of it and where to take it. it’s how a place becomes both wonderful and trying, all at once.

— Kathy Zhou

The Chronicle recess ThursDAY, sepTember 19, 2013 | 3

Help BuildFORT DUKEFRiDay, 9.20.13

Sign up @ sustainability.duke.edu and help Duke break the world record for the largest structure made of reused cardboard boxes.

INSIDIOUS: CHAPTER 2Blumhouse ProductionsDirected By James Wan

by Gary Hoffman The ChroniCle

The fi rst “insidious” left a mark on me that took time to completely erase. i loved the movie, but for months after watching it, i’d be haunted at night by smiling man-nequins, black-dressed brides and some creep singing about tiptoeing through tulips. “insidious: Chapter 2” starts with the cold, dank feeling of betrayal the fi rst one left off with, but it quickly becomes a goofy romp through the supernatural that resolves much of the mystery left by the fi rst.

“insidious” follows the lambert fam-ily, whose son, Dalton (Ty Simpkins), pos-sesses the ability to separate from his body and walk in a spirit world called The Fur-ther. While in this state, other spirits can possess him. Dalton’s father, Josh (Patrick Wilson), also has this ability, and in the last movie he used it to retrieve his son from The Further.

Unfortunately, while Dalton could re-turn to his body, Josh’s was taken over by a bride in black who has haunted him since his childhood. in “insidious: Chapter 2,” the family uses the help of some ghost hunters to research the ghost of the bride in black, travel through The Further and retrieve Josh’s spirit after destroying the

mother of the ghost that possessed Josh.

The tone of the movie was much more cheesy and sensational than the fi rst. i missed the dark nuances that pervaded “insidious,” where the overall mood turned silly things, like Tiny Tim’s loopy singing

by Christina LanThe ChroniCle

The ‘Young Blood’ teens have grown up. After spilling out testimonies of reck-less youth, The naked and Famous took a three-year break to craft their next album. Somewhere in that gap, Thom Powers and Alisa Xayalith admitted to facing multiple writing blocks. even through the struggles of this artistic soul-searching purge, the journey for something new paid off.

Past the band’s days of distorted ex-perimentation comes “in rolling Waves,” which consists of a progression of care-fully constructed tracks, each signifying a greater maturity of sound. on “Passive Me, Aggressive You,” The naked and Famous portrayed themselves as misfi t rebels. The dance-pop hit ‘Young Blood’ was an instant chart-topper, infused with Alisa Xayalith’s punchy vocals and an explosion of synths.

While that edgy-pop feel isn’t lost on The naked and Famous’s newest album, the sentiment has certainly changed. The lead single, ‘hearts like ours,’ pulses with a different kind of energy. Backed by pia-no-driven power chords, lyrics like “could we try to reinvent” attest to a rebirth of sound. True to this clearer approach to

production, the album fea-tures more acoustic and al-most folk-like elements, as showcased on the opening track ‘A Stillness.’ Alisa’s initial drone-like vocals, set against the sharper rhyth-mic guitar chords, make for an interesting mix. But subtle nuances of machine-like noise become increas-MUSIC

FILM

Special to the chronicleSpecial to the chronicle

IN ROLLING WAVESThe Naked and FamousSomewhat Damaged

or a mannequin’s deranged smile, into psychotic nightmares. i had trouble not laughing at parts in “insidious: Chapter 2” because the fast pace didn’t make room for any real tension or darkness to develop. The scares—mostly pop-ups—seemed forced and out of place.

Still, insidious: Chapter 2 is its own movie, and i did enjoy it. Direct commu-nication with the ghosts gave the movie a cheaper feel, but it helped explain a lot of the backstory and history of the char-acters. Also, time travel within The Fur-ther helped add some witty connections with the fi rst fi lm. The simultaneous plot lines made the movie feel like an action fl ick or thriller. They were a refreshing turn from the darkness seen in director James Wan’s other works, such as “Saw” or “The Conjuring.”

“insidious: Chapter 2” offered a fast-paced ride through a world that was left a mystery at the conclusion of the fi rst mov-ie. As a straight-up horror movie it was a little light and cheesy, but as a sequel it was immensely satisfying and helped tie up a lot of loose ends.

And for those who missed the demon-ic, red-faced dude from the fi rst fi lm, the ending made pretty clear we’ll see him again in the third install-ment.

ingly audible and suddenly the song seems to deconstruct itself, drawing in some MGMT-like chaos.

The naked and Famous’s newest album does not exclusively feature their talent for synthesized electronic manipulation. The electronic processing is much more subtle and therefore stronger. The use of distortion in the ending passages of the band’s title track, ‘like rolling Waves,’ is barely discernible, but its presence affi rms that the band has not lost their psychedel-ic origins. The band also proves their fl ex-ibility in ‘The Waltz,’ where Thom Powers and Alisa Xayalith emulate The xx with a duet over a minimalist background. The outcome is an infectious looping of sooth-ing vocals paired with surges of light, bell-toned synths. Another defi nite hit is ‘i Kill Giants,’ a synth-pop tune that could very well be their next dance fl oor anthem. once again, with producer Thom Powers, the band seems to have mastered the art of building striking layers of melodies.

it does seem, however, that by trying to divert from its previously rebellious na-ture, the band has lost some of the spunk that differentiated “Passive Me, Aggressive You” from the other alternative and elec-tronic music that emerged at the same time. But then again, many bands evolve at some point to survive. And on “like rolling Waves,” The naked and Famous have transformed quite successfully.

>> ON THE WEB <<Check out more film & music

reviews at dukechronicle.com/section/recess

4 | ThursDAY, sepTember 19, 2013 recess The Chronicle

Local initiatives bring new perspectives to Durham art sceneMotorco reimagines classic film

by Anna Vivian The ChroniCle

it takes a special kind of project to unite a community of friends and strangers, a music venue and one of the most weep-worthy movies of all time under the banner of one ambi-tious outpouring of creativity.

This project is “old Yeller Still Dies,” a movie mashup event set to screen at Motorco Music hall this Sat-urday. The premise: take a beloved film, divide it into scenes, assign those scenes to over thirty groups of people, allow those people to film their own versions of the scenes and recombine the material into a (sort of) cohesive work of movie magic. in a promotion for the event, Motorco assures, “old Yeller is still going to die at the end but it’ll be much more fun to watch it happen this time around.”

“old Yeller Still Dies” is the brain-child of Frederica Almond, the self-proclaimed “mad scientist behind the project.” her Durham Movie Mashup series, which sprung from an annu-al talent show put on by a group of Almond’s friends, is now in its third year. one year, Almond decided to “redo ‘Top Gun’” as her talent—an idea that she said “of course doesn’t make sense.” however, that idea led to the concept of a group movie ef-fort. The first mashup was “Top Gun: Mach one,” a re-imagining of Tom Cruise’s famous airplanes and volley-ball film, and last year’s mashup was “Karate Kid Kimchee Kiki.” This year’s reproduction of “old Yeller” will feature the same country life and tragic rabidity plot points as the original but prom-ises surprises in the way of puppetry, animation and a slew of dog actors.

Almond described the process of making the films as “three parts ridiculously fun, one part ridiculously stressful.” What started as a small project among friends has grown into a larger community effort, and almost no one has professional vid-eo or moviemaking experience. “i didn’t know anything about editing when i first started,” said Almond, but she has learned a lot by making these films. She asks that scenes be turned in to her four weeks before the screening, and during those four weeks she spends “every extra min-

ute” of her free time editing. Almond keeps herself entertained along the way with small in-jokes: “i enjoy put-ting in little easter eggs,” she said. “like i try to find a way to weave in at least one quick scene from ‘Arrested Development’ for each movie.”

This combination of fun and stress is reiterated by Catherine Petrusz, a participant in all three mashups. She

played Maverick in “Top Gun: Mach one” and Mr. Miyagi in “Karate Kid Kimchee Kiki,” and this year went behind the camera to film her own dog, Gladys, as old Yeller. of “old Yeller Still Dies,” Petrusz said, “like anything really rewarding, it involves hard work. learning how to use video-editing software can be time-consuming and tedious. Getting your dog or mother to do what you want while you film them can also be te-

dious.”But the process is enjoyable and

the payoff is even better. Petrusz commented on the rewards of the final product coming to fruition. She said that “seeing the huge vari-ety and creativity of all the different people who sent in their short clip” is the best part of the project. A close second, maybe, is the fact that a dog movie was chosen this year, which means there should be “a dozen or more ridiculously cute dogs” playing the eponymous character.

Perhaps what is most surprising is the community-building effect of what is, at its core, a goofy art proj-ect. Almond studied psychology and, in her “day job,” spends “a lot of time thinking about how resilient com-munities are created.” From her per-spective, the Durham Movie Mashup series is one way to combat social comparison and a poisonous culture of critical scrutiny. each participant is assigned a different scene and given free rein over its content, with the opportunity to be as silly and cre-atively daring as he or she chooses. The result is a diverse multiplicity of scenes that are appreciated, rather than judged, by all.

in Almond’s words, “People push themselves creatively, and then they have a shared experience to meet

each other without the push for comparison.” Petrusz agreed, say-ing, “When you give a bunch of dif-ferent people the same creative task, you come up with just as many totally different creations.” in any case, par-ticipants are abundantly enthusiastic about one another’s work, and that enthusiasm translates to the forging of a unique—and uniquely positive—community. Almond put it bluntly, though fondly, with the assessment that “many connections between strangers have been made as we laugh at ourselves looking ridiculous on the screen.”

Almond tries to shy away from sounding pretentious or “ridiculous,” a word that appears often in conjunc-tion with this movie, but in the end she said, “The entire project is built upon what i consider a radical act of resistance to our comparison culture. i try to build an ephemeral commu-nity where people can experience the opposite—where we are all there to support each other while we make a**es of ourselves for no obvious im-mediate gain. i believe resiliency and true community are born in these moments.”

“Old Yeller Still Dies” will play this Sat., September 21, in the Motorco Music Hall Showroom. Doors open at noon, and show starts at 1 p.m. Admission is free.

“Old Yeller

“The entire project is built upon what I consider a radi-cal act of resistance to our

comparison culture.” — Frederica Almond,

“mad scientist behind the project”

Sophia palenberg/The ChroniCle

This year’s reproduction of “Old Yeller” will feature the same country life and tragic rabidity plot points as the original but promises surprises in the way of puppetry, animation and a slew of dog actors. The Old Yeller/Lassie mash-up above illustrates the spirit of this unique event.

still dies”

The Chronicle recess ThursDAY, sepTember 19, 2013 | 5

Local initiatives bring new perspectives to Durham art scene SiteWork promotes

contemporary art in Triangle Motorco reimagines classic film by Anna Mukamal The ChroniCle

SiteWork has developed rapidly since its inception in January 2013. The four founders “laid the ground-work” for SiteWork out of a desire “to see more artist-led, artist-driven initiatives in the Triangle,” said co-founder lincoln hancock.

“The four of us each have specific strengths, and we all chipped in equally,” said harrison haynes, another co-founder. Both hancock and haynes are north Carolina-based artists and musicians. Along with art advisor Chloe Seymore and artist neill Prewitt, their teamwork reflects “one of [SiteWork’s] explicit goals: bringing the work of Tri-angle-based artists into the broader conversation in or-der to encourage collabora-tion between local and in-ternational artists.”

one of SiteWork’s even-tual objectives is to own a residential space to allow out-of-town artists to live in the Triangle to work on long-term projects.

“This idea of psycho-geography—of being con-nected not just to a physical environment but also to a mediated environment—is something i explore in my

artwork,” said hancock. Yet SiteWork primarily fa-cilitates the growth of con-temporary art within the Triangle.

“The Triangle is where we live, but we’ve also cho-sen to be here because we see a lot of artistic poten-tial here,” said hancock. he went on to explain that the SiteWork founders “feel strongly that there is some amazing work being done here, yet the poles of the national and international conversation tend to travel through new York and l.A. even though the South is an increasingly important cultural component of the United States.”

haynes alluded to the impact of the hopscotch Music Festival, which took place two weekends ago in downtown raleigh and brought international bands to play alongside lo-cal bands.

“We wanted to mirror that kind of collaboration in a contemporary art con-text,” said haynes.

So, they did this at Site-Work’s grand debut—Site-Work/hopscotch—which offered seven indoor and outdoor art projects with-in walking distance of the concert grounds.

Fittingly, the “visual work had tones that could be construed as music as well,” said haynes. “hop-scotch weekend was about featuring artists who can be described as dual practitio-ners, masters of the overlap between music and visual art.”

This theme resonates well with one of haynes’s personal goals: reconciling his pursuit of drumming and visual arts.

“i’m trying to figure out how to combine both with-out one being the detri-ment of the other,” he ex-plained. At this point in his artistic trajectory, he sees connections between mu-sic and artwork that he had never previously imagined.

hancock mirrored the importance of discovery in a practical sense.

“We are aware of, learn-ing about and making con-nections with similar or-ganizations in other parts of the city and region,” he said. “it’s good to know that there are people doing sim-ilar things in other cities, but i am unaware of an ef-fort exactly like SiteWork.”

SiteWork’s first major project at SiteWork/hop-scotch may have been a resounding success, but it

“was on a shoestring bud-get. SiteWork is not about making money, but Site-Work needs money,” han-cock explained. “We really appreciated the help of sev-eral sponsors who gave us in-kind and material dona-tions.” one of SiteWork’s most pressing goals is rais-ing money for upcoming projects.

“We want to be able to pay artists well for what they do,” said hancock.

haynes described how his time at the rhode is-land School of Design pre-pared him—or failed to prepare him—for his pro-fessional career.

“Quickly after graduat-ing from riSD, it became clear that i had to be very resourceful to find em-ployment opportunities,” he said. “You kind of have to be your own business-man, and while i love riSD and credit it with defining my creative prac-tice and sensibility, there was no curricular feature there that offered me the nuts and bolts on how to survive as an artist in the real world.”

This financial aspect of the professional art scene partially explains why Site-Work promotes and fa-cilitates artwork that lacks exhibition venues or local support.

“We ultimately want to provide people with more opportunities to experi-ence contemporary art,”

said hancock. “At the same time, we want to give the artist the kind of support and stability that a gallery can provide, but in the con-text of innovative exhibi-tion opportunities.”

hancock feels that the public is becoming more aware of, and interested in, contemporary work.

“The problem is that all of that energy seems to be focused into museum-like institutions,” he said. “There are very few inde-pendent galleries in the Triangle that feature con-temporary art—especially video or performance—since most commercial galleries focus on sellable artwork in order to be fi-nancially stable.”

SiteWork aims to pro-mote contemporary art in ways that transcend the tra-ditional museum or gallery apparatus.

hancock summed up SiteWork’s mission: “We want to structure opportu-nities for artists to do con-temporary art more effec-tively and more broadly.

And while SiteWork is based in raleigh, Durham and Chapel hill, we want to achieve this goal in the con-text of the nationwide and worldwide art scene.”

SiteWork’s upcoming proj-ects in the Triangle will be an-nounced on a rolling basis. For more information about the or-ganization’s artists, sponsors, and exhibitions, please visit http://siteworknc.com/.

Special to the ChroniCle

This year, SiteWork partnered with Hopscotch Music Festival in Raleigh.

Special to the ChroniCle

The new organization extends contemporary art beyond museums and galeries.

6 | ThursDAY, sepTember 19, 2013 recess The Chronicle

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Gardens are as intertwined with civilization as the wheel. From the horticulture depicted in egyptian tomb paintings to the Gardens of Versailles, gardens have represented the union between mankind and na-ture throughout history. Classic texts recount wonders like the hanging Gardens of Babylon which celebrated opulence, while the emergence of parks in medieval times were a means of trapping game for the aristoc-racy. The garden is one of the earliest manipulated landscapes of civilization, one of the earliest indicators of status and one of the earliest arts.

The Paradise Garden Project at the Carrack Mod-ern Art will celebrate this vibrant history of the gar-den, as well as its contemporary importance, through a multimedia installation created, recorded and gar-dened by the local community.

“The entire Paradise Garden Project should invoke a sense of the sacredness of nature and by being inside the gallery, one will be a part of it,” related lee Moore Crawford, one of the lead organizers and artists in the project. “The viewer will be a part of the exhibit as one may be in a cathedral, mosque, temple or garden.”

earlier this year, Crawford contacted artists from the local community to put together this installation. Craw-ford was inspired by the concept of Persian gardens, which use aesthetic means to play with the balance of elements. The aim of a garden is to apply the orga-nization of the aesthetic to the natural aspects of the earth. in particular, Persian gardens balance sunlight with shade and interior structures with exterior land-scapes. This balance is similarly evoked when living in a city where nature and development are often at odds. The exhibit seeks to bridge these polarized concepts through this artistic space.

For artist Katherine Whalen, the exhibit represents the evolving change representative of nature’s relentlessness.

“There’s this whole idea of change, of taking a walk and seeing nature along your journey, like moss or fl owers. Then, when you take the same walk a few weeks later and you encounter the same elements, you

realize they have decayed—they are changed, and so are you,” said Whalen.

As her piece, Whalen is contributing organic fash-ion. She was inspired by a photography book that showed the organic fashions of African tribes that adorned themselves with mud, braided leaves and sprays of yellow berries. like the communities she admired, she wanted to create fashion from natural elements that both celebrated human skill and the beauty of the earth. Whalen decorated a hat with various types of moss and other living features. The hat itself has thrived with growing fungi and sprout-ing leaves. Consistent with Whalen’s comments, the hat has changed over time as parts of it have grown and decayed.

Many other pieces in the installation are similar to Whalen’s organic hat, utilizing resources from the en-vironment. For her part, Crawford is contributing a photo series of fl oral elements in her yard from early spring through late summer.

“The photos act kind of like a diary: abstracted re-cordings of fl owers arranged in the same place and pho-tographed in the same place,” said Crawford. “The pho-tos are in an installation arranged behind a table with a living still-life of fl owers and a string of prayer beads.”

in addition to Whalen and Crawford, other art-ists include Maryah Smith overman, who is making a sculptural entrance; Jennifer Collins-Mancour, who is doing a fi gurative sculpture with plant and insect elements; entomologist Annie Spikes, who is mak-ing a lattice from bees’ honeycombs; linda Dallas, who is creating on-site window drawings inspired by orchards; Anne Marie Kennedy, who is combining botanicals in ethereal handmade paper creations; and Ben Greene who will bring a seven-foot tall liv-ing wall.

Appropriately, the word “garden” descends from the old english term “geard,” which means barrier or enclosure, and this meaning often still holds true to-day. Gardens continue to be an enclosed space, even more dramatically emphasized within developed cities like Durham. in a landscape dominated by inorganic skyscrapers and cemented sidewalks, entering into a

garden can feel like entering into a whole other world. The barriers of a garden are contrary to the aim of the Paradise Garden Project, which seeks to bridge the distance between the urban environment and natural habitats.

Crawford’s initiative seeks to broaden its reach by not only including the local, personal community but also the ecological community. Many aspects of the exhibit were collaborative, and most of the ma-terials were taken from the immediate environment. Apart from its variety of materials, the exhibit brings together myriad perspectives and mediums, allowing it to become a space for conversation, music, drawing and poetry.

“The issues explored may not be comfortable but there is the innate beauty of nature,” refl ected Craw-ford. “hopefully, by seeing oneself in and relating to the art, we become a part of the installations and events and hence a part of the web of life.”

The Paradise Garden Project runs until October 5 at The Carrack Modern Art. On September 28, there will be a work-shop with music and discussion. Other events include an eve-ning of poetry on October 3, and the closing reception with a gallery talk on October 5.

Carrack’s exhibition celebrates nature, communityby Katie Fernelius

The ChroniCle

Special to the chronicle

Dashboard Confessional’s Chris Carrabba comes to NC with new band. Full article at dukechronicle.com/section/recess/